Isn't that just what Mr. Dotcom did? Why leave him out? Simply providing a service to share files would not be piracy, if the owner of the content of the files had no objection.
Similarly, simply selling Rolex watches is no crime. Simply selling Rolex fakes is a crime.

because dotcom did other things as well...check wiki...

So just how then is a filehoster gonna check every file uploaded??

01-21-2012 01:14 PM

buddyholly

Re: HELP STOP SOPA AND PIPA (the Thing That Will Kill Freedom Of Speech For Us Citize

so simply providing a service to share files is piracy?? (I am not talking about Mr. Dotcom, but in general...)

Isn't that just what Mr. Dotcom did? Why leave him out? Simply providing a service to share files would not be piracy, if the owner of the content of the files had no objection.
Similarly, simply selling Rolex watches is no crime. Simply selling Rolex fakes is a crime.

01-21-2012 01:00 PM

sicko

Re: HELP STOP SOPA AND PIPA (the Thing That Will Kill Freedom Of Speech For Us Citize

By arresting the pirates, maybe? As has just happened to Mr. Dotcom in his New Zealand hideout. It is the online pirates who actually restrict freedom, by making it necessary to take measures to stop them.

By the same reasoning, I gladly go through airport security. It constricts my freedom, but I find it preferable to allowing unrestricted terrorism, as if that would make my life freer.

so simply providing a service to share files is piracy?? (I am not talking about Mr. Dotcom, but in general...)

01-21-2012 12:52 PM

buddyholly

Re: HELP STOP SOPA AND PIPA (the Thing That Will Kill Freedom Of Speech For Us Citize

please tell me how in earth are you gonna stop online piracy without constraining freedom severely?

By arresting the pirates, maybe? As has just happened to Mr. Dotcom in his New Zealand hideout. It is the online pirates who actually restrict our freedoms, by making it necessary to take measures to stop them. I think it is a selfish attitude to just say let the Mr. Dotcoms steal billions from other people as long as I can get a couple of bucks worth of stuff for free.

By the same reasoning, I gladly go through airport security. It constricts my freedom, but I find it preferable to allowing unrestricted terrorism, as if that would make my life any freer. Sure, I would like to go straight from check in to the boarding gate without anyone ''severely constraining'' my freedom to carry a stick dynamite in my underwear (teethee), but I don't think it would make me feel any freer, just more vulnerable.

01-21-2012 12:11 PM

sicko

Re: HELP STOP SOPA AND PIPA (the Thing That Will Kill Freedom Of Speech For Us Citize

SOPA may be dead, but that does not mean Internet piracy must be allowed to continue in order to protect people who do business with criminals. ''Mr. Dotcom'', the billionaire owner of Megaupload has a criminal record dating back to 1998. He has been using the internet for criminal activity for 14 years. And you are sympathetic to the people who gave him their private property for safekeeping? Caveat Emptor!

You might as well advise the victims of Bernie Madoff to sue the US government for shutting down his pyramid scheme, because they had entrusted their money to him and the US government had jeopardised the security of their investments.

As with Bernie Madoff, anyone cheated by Mr. Dotcom should sue Mr. Dotcom, don't you think?

please tell me how in earth are you gonna stop online piracy without constraining freedom severely?

01-21-2012 12:03 PM

buddyholly

Re: HELP STOP SOPA AND PIPA (the Thing That Will Kill Freedom Of Speech For Us Citize

How will they manage to protect legitimate users of the websites they close? Spanish newspapers are loaded today with complaints from people who had been using Megaupload for years as a 'cloud' where they kept their own personal, legal files, from family photos and videos to work files. Right now, they've lost access to their own files. Lawyers are advising them to take legal action, the FBI could have sequestered the private property of several million people around the world.

SOPA may be dead, but that does not mean Internet piracy must be allowed to continue in order to protect people who do business with criminals. ''Mr. Dotcom'', the billionaire owner of Megaupload has a criminal record dating back to 1998. He has been using the internet for criminal activity for 14 years. And you are sympathetic to the people who gave him their private property for safekeeping? Caveat Emptor!

You might as well advise the victims of Bernie Madoff to sue the US government for shutting down his pyramid scheme, because they had entrusted their money to him and the US government had jeopardised the security of their investments.

As with Bernie Madoff, anyone cheated by Mr. Dotcom should sue Mr. Dotcom, don't you think?

01-20-2012 06:15 PM

peribsen

Re: HELP STOP SOPA AND PIPA (the Thing That Will Kill Freedom Of Speech For Us Citize

Anyway, today's news brings this...

Online Piracy Vote CanceledIt must have been really tough around the Senate without Wikipedia. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced Friday that the vote on a controversial—and highly unpopular—online piracy bill had been delayed indefinitely. The House later announced a similar measure for its equivalent bill, known as the Stop Online Piracy Act, or SOPA. The bills had caused Wikipedia and several other websites to go dark Wednesday in protest. While a number of high-profile senators had pulled back their support of the bills in recent days, it placed Democrats between two powerful interest groups: Hollywood, which supports a crackdown on online piracy, and Silicon Valley, which believes the bills in their current form would hinder the Internet’s business model. One of the Senate bill's sponsors, Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy, said delaying the bill is a victory for "overseas criminals" who would "drain our economy."

Newsweek,
January 20, 2012 12:30 PM

01-20-2012 06:11 PM

peribsen

Re: HELP STOP SOPA AND PIPA (the Thing That Will Kill Freedom Of Speech For Us Citize

Why was there no comment here when Spain adopted a similar law to the one the US is considering? Did you even know that Spain has already adopted this law when you declare Europe freer than the US for not adopting such laws?

Because the rumour that Spain has passed such a law is simply false.

First, the Sinde law is still held up in the Spanish Senate, open to ammendments, and even then it is not 100% sure that it will finally pass, though it is likely it will, but with some changes.

Second, it is in many ways a more than watered-down version of SOPA. Sinde will msotly bring Spanish laws in line with laws already in place in many Western European countries, while SOPA takes the red line several miles further into unchartered territory.

Third, unlike SOPA, it relates exclusively to Spanish websites and doesn´t pretend to give Spain a say on other countries' internet policies.

Fourth, it is aimed exclusively at websites that may be breaking the law. Individual consumers will not be targeted.

But leaving Spain aside, and returning to SOPA, several tough questions need to be answered.

If the US pretends it's own laws to be enforced transnationally, with no regard to international borders, just how do they plan to avoid other countries from acting against US websites if they think they violate their own laws?

How will they manage to protect legitimate users of the websites they close? Spanish newspapers are loaded today with complaints from people who had been using Megaupload for years as a 'cloud' where they kept their own personal, legal files, from family photos and videos to work files. Right now, they've lost access to their own files. Lawyers are advising them to take legal action, the FBI could have sequestered the private property of several million people around the world.

A couple of weeks ago I read (on Newsweek, I think) a critique of SOPA by an American informatic engineer. He said that, technically, the law was pretty clumsy, because it got rid of the links to illegal content, but not the contents themselves. If I understood his techno speech correctly, it's like if you get rid of the internet address MTF, but not of the page itself. Of course, whenever one enters MTF, one is really contacting a site on the internet that is identified by a code number. Most people don't know that number, so if they can no longer find it by typing MTF, for them it's as good as lost. However, people knowing the code would still be able to access. Trouble is, serious wrongdoers are far more likely to be sophisticated in this regard than the general public.

01-20-2012 01:17 PM

buddyholly

Re: HELP STOP SOPA AND PIPA (the Thing That Will Kill Freedom Of Speech For Us Citize

Why was there no comment here when Spain adopted a similar law to the one the US is considering? Did you even know that Spain has already adopted this law when you declare Europe freer than the US for not adopting such laws?